Eventually, Kieran finished giving information to the woman, and Anabelle walked with him to and down the elevators. He remembered the first time he had taken an elevator. [i]He was convinced it was a magic box of teleportation. He insisted on going on it again, and his uncle had laughed, saying that they would ride it again when they left. Though Kieran didn’t remember the rest of the patrons of the elevator, his uncle had turned and addressed them, since they had been so puzzled by the young boy’s ignorance about something as simple as the elevator. “My nephew. He’s Amish.” He stated. It was a trick the man had learned to explain even when he had struggled with understanding the world. He learned the phrase before he had any idea who the Amish were, though he learned more about them so that he could follow-through on the statement, before he became fully adept with learning about this world.[/i]

She pointed out the place where he could come in and make his payments. Kieran made a note of the line, not really fond of waiting around, though he could probably make it back to the hospital to make a few payments. He gave a slight not, and then turned back to Anabelle. “Thank you.” He responded, returning her smile. “For everything.” She left, and Kieran stood for a few moments before he walked back outside. The sky had darkened from both the rain and the sun setting. He had been in this world all day—hospitals were rather unpleasant places. He walked to the car, not minding the fact that he was getting quite wet, and got in. The keys were sitting in the center console, where he always kept them, though he had not bothered with a wallet that day.

The drive home, and indeed the rest of the evening, was rather uneventful. Though he had left things in a hurry in his home, he needed to clean here just as much. He threw his clothing, including the new sweatshirt in the wash, and then went to the bathroom to clean up the blood there. He ended up bringing a few of the supplies back home, cleaning there as well, before he finally went to bed. In the morning, another hop brought him back to the world of technology, and he took the sweatshirt out of the wash. He redressed, again in slacks, though he was in a dark blue button-down instead. He grabbed his wallet as well, and put a couple of hundreds in to make a payment to the hospital. Though his uncle had been a magic user as well, he wasn’t one who could sense the spirits and the energy of people. He, instead, had been a mind mage, focused on moving objects with his mind. His uncle had been a good man, but he had, like everyone else, used his abilities for his own gain. The method by which he had acquired the large sum of money in the house was likely less than honorable, but it had been quite a few years, and no one had ever pursued the man for the theft.

As he drove back to the hospital, Kieran thought about his dream the previous night. It was about Anabelle. He needed to confront her. In his dream, she was in his world. He racked his brain to try to remember the rest, but it simply wouldn’t come. In any case, the line wasn’t as horrible in the morning, though the people at the counter were no less grumpy. Perhaps they had been on since the evening. Kieran had, fortunately, gotten quite a bit of rest, and even a shower. He paid a portion of his bill, giving them a little more than six hundred dollars in twenties. He then went over to the front desk and asked where he could find Nurse Anabelle Oasis. When asked what he needed, Kieran replied that he had something that belonged to her, a half-truth he knew, but it was enough to get the person to direct him to the nurses station upstairs, to which she could be paged. 

Kieran followed the woman’s instructions to get to the desk, then made the same inquiry. His half-truth was that he wanted to return the sweatshirt, in case anyone else would need an extra garment. Since it was the hospital’s practice to cut off people’s clothing, he figured they probably went through quite a lot of clothing. Perhaps the people who owned hospitals were working in conjunction with the clothing industry, to ensure that people spent enough money on buying new garments. It was a silly thought, but Kieran often had them about the workings of this world.
-.-

Though she couldn’t imagine what exactly she had expected from the man, a simple [i]Good Luck[/i] was not it. She glanced at him and then turned away, pausing slightly as he spoke. He suggested relaxing, and she almost scoffed at the idea. If she could relax, then her ‘abilities’ wouldn’t be an issue and she wouldn’t have left home in the first place. He then said that if she needed anything, he would be here for a short while. She gave a slight nod, and then turned back towards the town, unaware that he needed help finding water. She would have helped him, but she got the impression that he would rather not be near her. Eventually she would explode and harm everyone around her. It was only a matter of time before the right trigger came along. 

Rhys had been renting a room, and it was paid up through the next day as well. Taking advantage of that space, Rhys went up to her room and washed up. She didn’t really [b]have[/b] to leave immediately. Someone else might have noticed her temper, though in a bar full of drunks, she wasn’t terribly concerned about that. Rhys was more concerned that the small town would ostracize her. The tavern owner was an important man in this town, and with him associating her leaving with the deaths of his well-known patrons, she was probably already being sketched for a wanted poster, along with the gentleman who had actually committed the act.

It was amusing, in a way. He had preached that she needed to control her actions, and yet she hadn’t actually murdered or even maimed anyone today. Rhys went to one of the market stalls when they were close to closing, figuring that she could barter more since they didn’t want to transport the food home and then back again the following day. She got rations for quite a few days, and found someone who would accept the foreign coins that Devon had used earlier. She had a couple of coins left, but figured she would need them for traveling. Rhys then risked one more night in the room she had paid for, sneaking around the outskirts of town the next morning rather than going through it. She had more this time than the first time she had left home, and though traveling with no end in sight was exhausting, it was something she would simply have to manage.